Republicans are holding meetings now on how to move forward. A fundamental question is, how do we appeal to the Asians, Hispanics, Blacks, and whatever sub-group supposedly doesn’t like us of late. We will assume, for the sake of argument that the Republican Party, and the United States government is worth saving, which I will concede is arguable at this point. We will also assume that Republicans actually want to win, which, as Vox points out, is probably an even more dubious proposition.
There are several things to consider. First, you need to read and understand the material Heartiste presents. Social Dynamics are incredibly important. If you approach an individual as if they are an authority and you desperately want their approval, they will downgrade your stature to below their’s. They will then likely view you as unworthy of their approval as a result. If you approach them as an equal or superior, and seek an alliance, the dynamic is different, and many times, it will produce a different outcome. You are not trying to curry favor with these communities, you are explaining why you are better than the Democrats, and that you want to ally with them.
Second, it is probably most illuminating to examine the Liberal’s strategy, to see what they are trying to do and what they have done. From an r/K perspective, the r-strategy in Cuttlefish is to first get the K-strategists fighting. Then, the r’s avoid the fight themselves, and sneak in and mate on the sly while the K’s are occupied fighting each other.
Here, Liberals have sought to get K’s within these sub-groups fighting (because only K’s form in-groups, and then loyally fight for their own in-group’s interests). How have they done this? They first fracture the culture, by intimating that it is not only OK to be different, and celebrate your Non-Americanism, but it would be disloyal to your foreigner friends to not do this.
Suddenly, you have American K’s dividing up into Latino Ks, Black Ks, Asian Ks, and so forth. r’s, meanwhile play a strategy of currying favor with the newly fractured groups, against the evil interests of the American people. K’s fight while Liberals curry favor all around, hoping to avoid the damage. K’s endure the hardships of battle with each other, and Liberals endure nothing adverse. It is a brilliant strategy.
Note, some have made the case that various minority groups are r, but if the individuals within these groups were, they would be actively seeking to betray their own group’s interests, to curry favor with outsiders. Merely by showing loyalty to an in-group, these individuals are demonstrating a fundamental K-drive which would indicate a psychology that would naturally lead to Conservatism – if that loyalty were directed to America. Indeed, many of their kids, when taken into the Marine Corps, or other service branch are innately primed to throw that loyalty to America. Loyal Americans, primed to show loyalty to America, regardless of race or creed, do not vote for Liberals or Democrats, as evidenced by the Republican surge after 9/11. It was then that we all pulled together as a country, patriotically (something Libs at the time found terrifying).
Unfortunately these things are best headed off before they begin. Now today, however, Libs have the country fractured, and groups are fighting. What to do? You could try to use shame to appeal to the groups to throw their loyalty back to the nation. This will work with any group, but to make this interesting we will deal with Hispanics, who have been much more successfully made to view America as a foreign country, second in importance to their Latino/Mexican cohort.
First, approach the Latino group’s leaders as equals, but apologetically, and explain, we feel deeply that we can’t do anything about immigration now, because we have a real jobs crisis in this country. To support bringing more workers into the country, when Americans now can’t find work, would be disloyal to America, and fellow Americans, and you just can’t do that, on principle. Notice, you don’t call them disloyal outright, you just point out apologetically, that you can’t do what they want, because you feel it would be disloyal to your country, ie their country too.
This drives Narcissists (as will gravitate to lead such movements) wild, because you didn’t out and out call them disloyal or unpatriotic, so they can’t explode in rage. In fact, although they will see the implication immediately, they will feel that most people may not have noticed that this is a logical conclusion of your argument. As a result, they will be hesitant to oppose what you said, for fear of calling attention to this fact. To stand up and say you called them unpatriotic is to finish a line of logic you left unfinished, and point out to everyone that there is a line of logic which says they are a traitor to their countrymen.
In my experience, Narcissists will first be quiet, and stop all opposition. Second, they will be horrified inside that someone just said they are disloyal, and yet they can’t respond to contradict it. And third, the aversive stimulus their amygdala will release will make them try to avoid that line of dialog in the future, and that will often entail dropping the entire subject. As this occurs, the fractured grassroots base, which is more composed of misdirected K’s, will see their leaders abandon this line of activity, as well as see the logic implying that such a line of action is disloyal to America, and they will care less about it themselves. It would need to be repeated, but that is what talking points and standard answers are for. Over time, they would develop an contravening amygdala pathway associating lobbying for foreigners over fellow Americans with being out-grouped in America, and the support for this would diminish in a manner proportional to the frequency of conditioning.
There is a second way to bring the Hispanics back into the American fold, however. Presently, Liberals have caused the Hispanic amygdalae to flag Republicans as an enemy. That is bad, because amygdala pathways are nearly impossible to erase. However, from a Cognitive Neuroscience perspective, note that the amygdala flags items according to importance. As a result, the easiest way to shut off that “Republican enemy” flag, is to replace it with a bigger flag, by creating a bigger battle, with a bigger enemy.
Presently Liberals are doing all sorts of things noxious to any normal person, if it is pointed out. They are basically destroying small business, so appeal to Latino business owners, showing them what an enemy the Obama administration is to them. Jobs are crap, because of Leftist economic policy, so argue Latinos can’t find jobs because of Leftism, and show them why. Healthcare is going to be an abomination shortly because of Leftist policy, if England is any measure. Highlight, in personal terms, how bad that is going to get, and show, in personal terms, that this Leftist push will, inevitably, result in health rationing that will kill some of the people Latino Americans care about. Highlight that Leftist don’t care. I could go on, but you get the picture. Liberals are the enemy. Programming like this is surprisingly easy to do. Look at how George W. Bush is now viewed as an empty-headed, callous, war-mongering tool, and you get the idea. All it takes is repetition, and these neural pathways are laid.
Right now, probe the Hispanic amygdala, and you will find a part dedicated to immigration, which sees Republicans, and fires off aversive stimulus, flagging them as an enemy. But there is much more amygdala there, sitting empty, and just waiting to be filled with aversive stimulus towards the Liberal movement.
You need to look at it like programming Pavlov’s dog, and begin creating perceptions that their beef with Republicans is minor compared to how the Liberals are screwing them – and especially their kid’s futures. As you do, subtly nudge them to view these problems of theirs as America’s problems as well. Once we have common problems, and common enemies, you can pull them in as allies, and begin to fuse the fractured America together again into one nation, allied against leftism. Nothing can unite two people like a common enemy who needs to be destroyed, and so it will be with the fractured parts of America which the Left has created for their own ends.
This is why I cringe when I see what Rove did with that $300 million in the last election. That could have been a ton of aversive stimulus for Liberals, which would have proven additive every election cycle, since amygdala pathways cannot be easily overwritten, and even if overwritten, are reactivated with the slightest reinforcement stimulus. Instead, that money was all wasted – and worse – it was wasted in a way which yielded no long term demonization of Liberals, that would have stayed with the populace. It was totally wasted, with no effect.
Which brings me to my final point. To do this, Republicans have to want to win. They have to be willing to stand up and call Liberals cowards and traitors, and highlight that they seek to fracture our country for their own personal benefit, and destroy our economic system out of envy for the successful. They have to be willing to get in an argument with Bob Sheiffer, and then use dog whistles and amygdala hijacks to give him a stroke, live on air. They have to view Liberals as worthless traitors who deserve a lot more than the mere outcast status the Republicans are inflicting upon them. In short, Republicans have to want to save this country so badly, that they are willing to speak simple truths.
Sadly, given their performance thus far, I think we are all best served merely preparing for the collapse.